Past Thursday Particle Seminar

I will describe how atom interferometry can be used to set limits on beyond the Standard Model forces.

If new particles are produced at the LHC, it is vital that we can extract as much information as possible from them about the underlying theory.  I will discuss some recent work on extracting spin information from invariant mass distributions of new particles.  I will then introduce the Kullback-Leibler method of quantifying our ability to distinguish different scenarios.  

We consider two-stage inflationary models in which a superheavy scale F-term hybrid inflation is followed by an intermediate scale modular inflation. We confront these models with the restrictions on the power spectrum of density perturbations P_R and the spectral index n_s from the recent data within the power-law cosmological model with cold dark matter and a cosmological constant. We show that these restrictions can be met provided that the number of e-foldings N_HI* of the pivot scale k*=0.002/Mpc during hybrid inflation is appropriately restricted. The additional e-foldings required for solving the horizon and flatness problems can be naturally generated by the subsequent modular inflation realized by a string axion.